Dozens protest CME Group incentives in Loop

A CME worker appears annoyed while cleaning up, after approximately 50 to 60 activists placed a golden toilet in the lobby of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, Jan. 24, 2012. (Antonio Perez/Chicago Tribune)

Dozens of moms, dads, community leaders and young activists chanted slogans against CME Group Inc.'s "corporate welfare" as they delivered a golden toilet to Chairman Terry Duffy.

"We are here to speak to chairman Terrence Duffy and deliver a golden toilet, a beautiful luxurious gift," said Shani Smith, one of the protesters inside the lobby of CME's headquarters building at 20 S. Wacker Drive.

The toilet was a sign of displeasure with the numerous state and local incentive packages CME has received, including tax increment financing funds to renovate the building's bathrooms.

Security guards in black suits stood by expressionless with radios in hand. "We have a situation," one said as protesters chanted, "How do you put folks back to work? Tax, tax, tax the Merc."

After numerous attempts to get Duffy, protesters marched away, leaving the golden toilet with a red ribbon and toilet paper in the lobby. Security scrambled for a few minutes to get maintenance to take the toilet away. A man in a blue uniform ran to the rescue, dropping the tank lid as he raised it.

"Where do you want it?" he asked.

"Anywhere," someone said. Anywhere but the lobby was the undertone.

CME spokesman Michael Shore wouldn't comment on the protest. "However, on the tax issue, the disparity in corporate taxes was debated, discussed and resolved in the state legislature," he wrote in an email.

CME's latest break would cut its tax bill by nearly half when it is fully implemented in the state's 2014 fiscal year. Last year, CME, owner the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the Chicago Board of Trade, threatened to leave the state after a tax increase that it said raised its bill to about $158 million in 2011 from about $108 million in 2010.

The protest was organized by Stand Up! Chicago, a coalition of people from labor unions and community groups. The group has organized similar protests in Chicago.

One of the protesters, Maria Hueramo, got emotional as she explained why she waited for the protest to start by the Madison Street bridge.

"I get strength from seeing so much injustice," Hueramo said as she shivered in a light coat on a 20-degree morning. Her husband, she added, has been struggling for more than two years to secure a stable job in construction. And her daughters, she said, often work until 1 a.m. to pay for college.

"My daughters have been paying taxes since they were in their third year in high school. It upsets me that (politicians) are even taking my daughters' money to benefit businesses," Hueramo said.

Other incentives to CME, which employs about 2,000 people in Chicago, include:

A 2008 tax incentives package that allows it to claim $405,000 in tax breaks over 10 years to retain 25 workers and spend at least $74.1 million building a data center in Aurora.

In 2009, Chicago promised $15 million in tax increment financing funds over 10 years for renovations at the CBOT Building, CME's headquarters at 20 S. Wacker Drive and its offices at 550 W. Washington St.

CME Group promised to retain 1,750 positions and create 638 jobs in Chicago. The company said it needed the funds to fend off its main competitor when it bid for the Chicago Board of Trade. The funds also persuaded the firm to stay in Chicago after it acquired NYMEX Holdings Inc. in 2008 instead of moving to that exchange's offices in New York.

After the 2007 merger of the Merc and CBOT, CME Group acquired the CBOT building, a three-building complex at 141 W. Jackson Blvd. The art deco skyscraper, which was built in 1929, underwent a $22.6 million renovation in 2006. The renovations were aided by a Class L Cook County property tax credit worth about $9.8 million over 12 years. CME Group is still eligible to receive those credits.